Better late than never. This happened last week. Chris Matthews went on a great rant about, Why did we go to war in Iraq? Why? He mentions neoconservative ideas, but he doesn't dare bring up the elephant in the room, the Israel lobby. Still this is a start, to get unhinged about a fraud:
MATTHEWS: You know, I argued against the war because I was skeptical from day one about the case they made for nuclear weapons. And now it turns out they don‘t even make the case anymore. Here‘s Rumsfeld with his big tome, admitting in it that they didn‘t have—they had no—we‘re going to get to all the facts but we did it last night—no evidence of any purchases of nuclear weapons, no evidence of any attempt to purchase, and no evidence of any construction of nuclear weapons. Zero nuclear weapons, simply the possibility that he intended at some point to do that and then to find out that the director of intelligence is basically saying all the evidence they had is imprecise. And then, today, we get the report, the curve ball, talk about the aluminum tubes or whatever, that he was lying just to get whatever he wanted because he hated Saddam. No evidence. It‘s almost the most purest form of dishonesty. And I have to wonder—did they know they were doing this? Bush, Condi, Powell, Cheney, the rest of them—why didn‘t they get this fact there was no intel?
FRED KAPLAN, SLATE: There‘s a phrase—there‘s a phrase about a prosecutor who tries to frame a guilty man. You know, I think they thought, well, of course, Saddam has nuclear weapons. Why wouldn‘t he have nuclear weapons? There haven‘t been any inspectors there for five years. He did it before. Why wouldn‘t he do it again? The CIA keeps saying, oh, no, we don‘t have any intelligence, but we don‘t believe the CIA. So, let‘s pull together, cherry-picked information -- from the raw intel files and construct a case that they may have it. And remember Dick Cheney‘s idea about the 1 percent factor?
MATTHEWS: Yes. But they didn‘t have 1 percent.
KAPLAN: I don‘t even—well, you can‘t even calculate these things because, you know, 50 percent of zero is still zero, right?
MATTHEWS: Why isn‘t this on the front page of “The New York Times”, lies?
ISIKOFF: -- to have the senior— intelligence officer in the Pentagon telling the secretary that we may know nothing about Iraq‘s intelligence programs. And, of course, in the book, what Rumsfeld does is he falls back and quotes the NIE, the NIE that the CIA had coordinated and put together that said that they did have nuclear weapons, that suggested they did have a nuclear program. What he omits is—
MATTHEWS: No, no. He quotes, although we assess—this is from the NIE report of October 2002, “Although we assess that Saddam does not have - - does not yet have nuclear weapons or sufficient material to make any, he remains intent on acquiring them.” It‘s intent.
KAPLAN: Artfully worded.
MATTHEWS: OK, guys, you went to grade school. I went to grade school. We all studied the causes of war. And they would say the immediate causes of war were one was assassination of Archduke Ferdinand or something, or the sinking—back to the sinking of the Maine, or whatever Spanish Civil War. Fred, we always had an argument given to us in school why there were wars. How in the world are you going to be able to explain this war to students coming along? What does a teacher say in a good school right now? Why did we go to war? Because somebody said they had nuclear weapons that they weren‘t supposed to have them under some decree that we put down after they lost the first war. Oh, do we have evidence they had nuclear weapons? Well, we thought they had the intention maybe of doing it. Therefore, we went over there and killed 100,000 Iraqis, 4,500 of our guys were killed, 30,000 of our people were wound, because we thought they might want to do this. How can you write that in a history book?
KAPLAN: Well, remember, Rumsfeld even goes further than you‘re suggesting. In his book, he says, well, you know, I never really put it on nuclear weapons. I thought we should go war for other reasons. But, by the way, he then quotes—he then quotes it, there‘s one piece of evidence he can‘t evade that after we were occupying the place for a while, somebody at a press conference said, where are the nuclear weapons? And he said, well, I—we know where they are. They are outside of Tikrit, in Baghdad.
MATTHEWS: Right.
KAPLAN: In the book he says, well, I wasn‘t talking about nuclear weapons. I was talking about suspect sites. Well, you know, by this time, everybody knew about the suspect sites. They are wondering where are the weapons.
MATTHEWS: This is—this is beyond—I just look at Bush. I think, some day, we‘re going to find out this guy under sodium pentothal, his last memoir when he‘s 90 years old, he‘s going to write, I admit, my reason for going to Iraq had something to do with the fact—well, I thought this would be a good way to spread democracy, and so, the big neocon argument. Or they shot my daddy or they‘re trying to kill my daddy, or some other reason. I don‘t know what Cheney‘s reasons are going to be.
...Condi Rice, if you‘re watching, Condoleezza Rice, you‘re a great person, I think. Why don‘t you raise hell about being used? Colin Powell, why don‘t you raise hell about being used? And, Cheney, you‘re hopeless. I don‘t expect any help from you. But I‘d like to hear from the good people in that administration, when they were talking about mushroom clouds with no evidence whatever. None. We went to war for no reason except they wanted to go to war. Last thought, Fred, quickly. KAPLAN: You know, Rumsfeld created a special office. It was called the Office of Special Plans. MATTHEWS: I know.
KAPLAN: They went into raw intelligence files. This was more about links between Saddam and al Qaeda. They picked out bits of raw intel that seemed to suggest they were there. The GAO, afterwards, criticized the outfit and said this was illegal, policy outfits were not supposed to be disseminating intelligence, and not a word of this is mentioned in Rumsfeld‘s book.
MATTHEWS: I know, it‘s going to be a cake walk, 100,000 dead people.
Chris you are a smart political mind; ask George W. Bush what he learned from the last one-term presidents, Jimmy Carter and his father; ask him what political lines they had crossed to end their White House careers?
And yes the fact that Matthews's panel is Fred Kaplan and Mike Isikoff is a reflection of the new Democratic establishment, one that is not yet prepared to do the hard work of reflecting on Jewish political identity and how Zionism swept that community as a messianic deliverance dream. Has either of these guys ever written about the Israel lobby as a real force in Jewish life, let alone American life? Note that this week the State Department replaced the late Richard Holbrooke with Marc Grossman and appointed a new ambassador to Israel named Dan Shapiro. I would say that it is naive not to think that these Jewish names are intended to placate a Democratic Party political establishment that is largely Jewish. A signal that nothing will be done to rock the boat. Matthews knows this better than anyone. He will talk about it some day when the Establishment is more diverse.
locate brick wall. face it. bang head. repeat.
A more direct link to Chris Mathew video:
link to msnbc.msn.com
I see he’s inspired by the effective activism on behalf of the ‘people’ of foreign media like AJE.
Guess he’s realized that the corporate msm he’s been working for might as well be state-run-media that fits oh so neatly into the Arab model of state-run-tv.
Still, it’s a very encouraging sign indeed. Kudos.
What will aipac now do?
He will talk about it some day when the Establishment is more diverse.
By that time, the American Jewish Establishment will be viewed as a discredited bunch of institutionalized murderers. They don’t have the time to talk about it “some day.” They better pipe up now. Recent events show they’ve lost the luxury of time.
When the economy tanks and people are paying $6 to $10/gal for gas, the veils of politesse and self-imposed gentile silence will drop. I’m already hearing it far from the corridors of DC, and it’s not anti-semitism, it’s weariness with the drama queen stance and victimhood, the equivalent of crying emotional ‘fire’ in the political theatre once too often. People are just fed up with this shit.
well spoken
When the Arab Embargo was imposed in retaliation for the USA jumping in to save Israel with air and navy vessels loaded to the hilt with “double of everything, take it from anywhere & get it to Israel now!” did Americans in the endless high priced gas lines connect the dots as to why that was suddenly happening? Did most Americans even know about Nixon’s air & sea lift? No. Did our MSM try to inform them? No.
The cause was Arab nutcases. It will be the same again. The cause will be Arab terrorists trying to murder Israel as the first step to establishing a new world Caliphate. Plus, for the bible-belters: They want to murder baby Jesus! Take him from me! Our MSM now says the cause of the Arab revolt is they live on $2 a day; yet Beck had an expert on his show this week who pointed to a chart listing the mean average of Arab income in each Arab country, which looked pretty good. Nobody mentioned the giant disparity in income within each country, just as when mean average American income is shown, it does not reveal how much of that income is clustered at the far end of the spectrum (the upper 1-5%). So, the new average POV of the average American will be Arab perfidy again! They just aren’t ready for democracy and we pay for their backward mentality with $10 gal gas!
He’s just NOW figuring this out? Dude….
Of course his calculus of destruction is way too minimized and sanitized. The true question we must ask ourselves as we face the mirror is, why did we destroy an entire country?? Why did we wipe out entire centuries of historic civilization that the Iraqis had so carefully and respectfully preserved?? Why did we enable the targeted assassinations of an entire generation of Iraqi intellectuals?? Why did we dump uranium on an entire generation, dooming their unborn children to birth defects and cancers? Why did we make it possible for Abu Ghraib to inflict searing trauma on so many Iraqi civilians for no reason whatsoever? And on and on…
We should all be haunted by these questions for the rest of our lives.
smart. agreed
>> The true question we must ask ourselves … is, why did we destroy an entire country?? Why did we wipe out entire centuries of historic civilization … Why did we enable the targeted assassinations of an entire generation of Iraqi intellectuals?? Why did we dump uranium on an entire generation … Why did we make it possible for Abu Ghraib to inflict searing trauma on so many Iraqi civilians for no reason whatsoever? And on and on…
The short answer? It was a hard choice, but the price was worth it.
This price, too. Some of it is going to someone, even if none of it is coming to me or to Chris Matthews.
link to costofwar.com
(Who is Chris Matthews?)
Why did we wipe out entire centuries of historic civilization that the Iraqis had so carefully and respectfully preserved??
Why did they (we) try to wipe out the cradle of civilization? so future generations could rewrite babylon?
Actually, that may be part of the motivation where it comes to kowtowing to the Lobby. See also: Eretz Israel.
gee ya think? what’s to stop future generations of zionists from using the same ‘logic’ used to conquer jerusalem in future centuries?
Well, what’s happening now in the Middle East is going to stop it, I think, but insofar as internal to Zionist war politics and ideology, you’re right, annie.
i don’t know if i’m right, but the thought crossed my mind. it’s hard to fathom the logic of wiping out the cradle of civilization.
i don’t compare that with wiping out millions of iraqis because ultimately as the inheritors they carry that past into the future. but all that history and preservation of mankind, just the thought of the newness of our american culture being responsible for wiping out so much of mankind’s past is a burden we can never repay or compensate. it’s a horror that haunts me.
Arabs understood all too painfully, all too completely, AND BEFORE THE FACT, what an offense and crime against mankind itself it would be to unleash a never seen before destructive ‘Shock and Awe’ military mission on an ancient city like Baghdad – by no less than a bunch of American twenty-something with low-grade education, taking orders from a buncha sixty-something islamophobes and cold-hearted imperialists.
We do it because Israel tells us to. Prior to the Afghanistan/Iraq wars, American hegemony has always been about preserving the local culture and history — because then you can impose a stagnant quality of life on your client states while you reap the rewards of their economy.
Nowadays, the average American couldn’t string together three facts about Babylonian civilization. The exceptions are just that. I know better, but I also recognize that my salvation in that regard has been privilege. Granted, it was privilege hard earned by my parents who worked their tails off to send me to private Catholic school up through 12th grade, but its privilege nonetheless.
Regan onwards has been the perfect storm for transmogrifying Washington DC into Classical Rome. But whereas the Roman Empire is a good model for understanding the US’ motivation, when it comes to Israel…
I get lambasted about this for drilling this notion, but it is absolutely vital for understanding how Israel works. Nazi Germany was driven by a desire to wipe out centuries of history in order to install a fully synthesized so-called “Aryan” culture and mythology from whole cloth. Israel is a direct analog of this. Think about it — “Deutschland uber alles” versus “the supremacy of the Jewish military against five Arab armies.” And “The land east of here belongs to us!” doesn’t even need translation.
That’s what the Birthright tours are about. It’s indoctrination, plain and simple. Zionists constructed their version of Disney Land in Palestine, with brightly painted tall walls to hide reality from view, and now they send American youths through a fabricated cultural narrative that is real enough to touch and smell and taste, but is fake nonetheless. Because behind those razorwire topped walls, where only the snipers and surveillance drones are allowed to see, is the original living history of Palestine.
Erasing history is a vital step to exerting total control over people. There is a generation of Iraqis growing up who will never know Baghdad as anything other than a city of concrete barriers, bullet holes and bomb craters. At the other end of the spectrum, Israel has almost succeeded in shutting out every last man, woman and child they ethnically cleansed from the land they were born in order to force them to be buried elsewhere, in the hopes that history will die with them.
Arabs understood all too painfully, all too completely, AND BEFORE THE FACT
i was in denial back then. i was in australia right before the war started and up to the day we entered i didn’t believe we would really do it. i knew we had no evidence. i knew. i kept screaming. there were protests all over the world, and all throughout america, a million marched in brazil..it was wide spread. i thought we wouldn’t go in.
but when we did and then incited the looting and did nothing to protect iraq. nothing. i knew what was really going on, in my heart of hearts i knew. it torments me, iraq does. torment. that is why i am a palestinian activist. that’s how i learned about palestine, from iraq.
Astute, chaos, truly.
Are you like me too, feeling like I’m visiting a black-clad funeral every time I enter a discussion about what we did to Iraq?
Annie,
Very strange. If Iraq is what you are mad about, why are you not working on making things there better?
Eee, I understand the entire scope of your world is exclusively about the profit of yourself and other Israeli Jews, so the notion of having any selfless cause is inconceivable, let alone several simultaneously.
Most of the local level groups I’m aware of that speak out against what your country is doing are anti-Occupation groups. That means we’ve organized at least as many, if not more, protests against the Iraq War and occupation, and its why preventing a war with Iran is given equal time in our community.
What a weird question eee.
Here’s THE ONE AND ONLY ANSWER to your question:
Cuz all troubled roads in the mideast lead straight to jerusalem!
actually eee my years long obsession with iraq (i blogged on other sites) is what eventually landed me in palestine. that is what i meant by that is why i am a palestinian activist. that’s how i learned about palestine, from iraq.
i didn’t even know what hasbara was but the gov trolls (those protecting our government narrative, this was their homefront..not where i blogged) all had one thing in common. they fiercely protected israel at every turn. plus they worshiped the idf and any chance to compare american expertise was always trumped by the ‘awesome’ israel lead. it was just finding out about the neocons, the plan for iraq originating by the neocon’s plan for israel (read the pnac plan originally written for sharon).
so hey, i realized protecting israel was the big tamale and who’s on the front line? palestinians. i just went to the heart of the problem as i saw it. i hope that answers your question.
btw, the big bad dominating army bloggers who used to direct the narrative @ the comment section of the COIN site abumuqawama were all fierce israel defenders back then too. the most efficient gov narrative bloggers were all hasbara hacks, so why argue with them 2 steps removed? why not just go after their homebase? it’s an infowarfare battleground out here.
it’s just a matter of smart logistics eee. they bit off more than they could chew w/iraq and outted themselves to otherwise unaware peace nix like myself, some of whom had not really even heard of little palestine before.
Bravo annie!
;)
i’m an info warrior taxi!
Annie,
Not really. There is so much that could be done to improve Iraq, but you waste money on sending ships to Gaza and on PR stunts. In Iraq many more people die each day of violence than in Palestine, yet your focus is not there. If you are mad about what the US did in Iraq, shouldn’t you be working to fix Iraq and make it better? Shouldn’t you be visiting Iraq more than you are visiting Gaza? How many times have you been to Iraq?
iraq is a humongous place with millions more people and land mass. palestine is a microcosm and just happens to be the place zionists covet the most. plus, the US is in iraq, so taking on the superpower protecting zion is a much tougher challenge.
we’re just little guys. a few people in a boat can bring much more attention and 100times that trying to fix iraq. besides, the trains left the station eee. i’m not the only person who has come to this conclusion. israel ran roughshod over palestine for decades and nobody saw it or noticed. the myths ruled. those days are just over, gone forever. we’re here and we’re not leaving. we’re battling for palestine and it’s israel’s greed that will bring it down. it should have declared borders and backed off. instead it’s going for more expansion.
you’re a fool eee. if you want to fight for israel you’re barking up the wrong tree here. you’re needed elsewhere
eee, all we have to do for Iraq to get better is leave the Iraqis alone. They’re perfectly capable of running their country without Western hegemony.
That won’t work in Palestine. If we leave the Palestinians alone, you’ll simply starve them to death, run them over with bulldozers and round them up into camps surrounded by 20-foot concrete walls, cyclone fence and razor wire.
Annie,
I am not battling you, I am trying to understand your position.
“taking on the superpower protecting zion is a much tougher challenge”
I am little confused here, isn’t the only way to go after Israel is to take on the superpower protecting it?
So if I understand your position, you are really against both the US and Israel?
As for sending useless boats to Gaza (when is yours arriving by the way?) do you really think that is more important than trying to undo even a little of the damage you did in Iraq? There were 1.5 million Christians displaced from Iraq. It dwarfs the Nakba and is happening now. Don’t you think it strange you are not trying to undo that problem but focusing on a problem that happened 62 years ago?
link to christiantoday.com
I hope you understand that to an objective outsider your obsession with Palestine looks very strange especially if Iraq is what you are angry about.
Me too Annie.
“objective outsider”
Dummy, that’s a contradiction in terms. I f you have posited yourself as an “outsider” you just lost your objectivity. You’ve already admitted you see no commonality.
And if this “objective outsider” who fiinds “your obsession with Palestine” “very strange” isn’t you, well then, unless you can produce him, you’re just bullshitting, as usual.
The boats are not useless. If they can get past the bloodthirsty Pirates of Tel Aviv, there are plenty of people who will benefit from having basic needs met. Not all of them, but then the humanitarian crisis could easily be solved if you Israelis decided to adhere to the Geneva Conventions and dozens of other human rights declaration and stop starving Palestinian society to death — literally as well as metaphorically.
I understand, the solution to the Iraqi Christian Nakba is sending boats to Gaza. Sure the Iraqis will take care of it by themselves. It has only gotten worse over time.
When there is a Nakba happening before your eyes and clearly your responsibility you prefer to ignore it. The Iraqi Christians are being terrorized and exiled? Pfff, who cares, let’s send a boat to Gaza, that will solve the problem.
Hello eee,
I cannot answer for Anne, but I can answer for myself, as your question applies as much to me as it does to Anne.
For me it is a matter of deciding where and who is a source of the destructive ideas and trying to make the difference at the source.
I believe that the disregard for international law, racism, occupation, ghettos, mainstreaming torture, censorship of media, rolling back the freedom of individual, attempts at destruction of human rights organisations, perverting and corrupting judicial courts are all sourced – or grounded, if you like – in the ideology of Zionism.
Before I focused on Zionism, I was on a receiving end of very similar ideology – Communism, so I know that the battle is winnable.
For better or worse, the Jews are influential intellectuals in many western countries, and the ideology that they share in their common love for Zionism and Israel is disseminated in those western cultures.
I believe that the sincerely held beliefs of Zionist Jews are influencing western elites.
And those influential economic, political and cultural groups all believe that International Law is to be interpreted in the favour of the strongest (regardless of it actually says); the same group believes that some races and/or cultures and/or religions of people are intrinsically better and more deserving than others; they believe that the political ideology has to be protected at the expense of individual freedom and using the state security apparatus.
If those groups make a powerful argument – and if they are gaining adherents – and their ideas take root in all the countries where there are strong showing of Zionists, then all those countries are simultaneously accepting unacceptable ideas and reinforcing each other in moving away from democracy and human rights.
My argument is that if I can convince Zionist ( or someone who by virtue of being better at debating can convince a Zionist) that theocratic supremacist police state that occupies untermenschen is not a good idea, but liberal democracy is a good idea, then I have prevented, downstream, another Iraq, Iran, military interventions in Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan etc.
My argument is that you have to fight the source of ideology, to prevent ideology from spreading.
So if I understand your position, you are really against both the US and Israel?
our foreign policy as it pertains to advancing the goals of the neocons, yes i am.
do you really think that is more important than trying to undo even a little of the damage you did in Iraq?
first of all you do not know anything about my efforts past or present wrt iraq nor will i discuss them with you here. go back and read my 12:48 comment.
eee you can deflect the answers all you want but for those of us who were against the invasion of Iraq in 2003 have learned — we lost that battle because of Israel. Their lobby here in the US had much more power than the millions of us who mobilized on the streets. We lost that one. There is nothing we can do to prevent that war. What we must do is to identify what made that war possible. And that is Zionism and Israel. Today, that needs to be central to our thinking or these forces will pull us into another of their crazy wars.
Do you understand eee — we are trying to prevent the next war. And, as was pointed out above, all roads to that war lead towards Jerusalem.
“Nowadays, the average American couldn’t string together three facts about Babylonian civilization.”
Rude of me to say this, I know, but many of us out here in the real world would suggest that the last three words of that sentence should be omitted.
Eva,
Your comment is pure antisemitism.
The Jewish elites and their Zionism are corrupting the world. They are the source of racist and supremacist ideas. Unbelievable, but there you are. And of course, not one of the “liberals” commenting bothers to call you out on this.
Long time reader, first time commenter. The amount of antisemitism permeating from the comment sections has really sky-rocketed as of late.
Hello eee,
You said that my comment is “pure antisemitism”.
I thought you may use this argument. It is as handy as it is instinctive. I can see that you are very uncomfortable with the idea that there may be:
A) Aspects of Zionism ideology that are unacceptable to supporters of Liberal democracy.
B) Zionist ideology may influence political thought of western countries.
Just because something is considered pure Anti-Semitism ( there is similarity of ideas put forward by Zionists in positions of influence in western countries), or pure Heresy (take the notion that Earth orbits the Sun) of purely Incomprehensible ( that sub-particles of atom can be either matter or wave depending what you measure them them with), or politically incorrect (that organic differences in sexes make them likely to excel in different working environments) – none of this gives any of the above ideas the God given right NOT to be examined in a cold light of day.
>> Your comment is pure antisemitism.
Your comment is pure stupidity. Zionism has proven – and continues to prove – that it is a hateful, supremacist, destructive and immoral ideology, whose proponents use hateful, destructive and immoral tactics to defend and promote it. (See your comment, quoted above.)
The only thing more depressing than the hatefulness and immorality of Zionism and of its hate-mongering supporters is the fact that so many non-Zionist politicians and public figures – rather than stand up for what is right and moral and just – succumb to the smears and defamation and other social and financial pressures exerted by pro-Zionists and their organizations.
You should have stuck to reading only. If the above is a sign of things to come, then your comments are going to be chalk-full of nonsense, lies, and spin.
No, eee–Zionism does not =all Jews. Your conflation is the cheapest negative tactic hasbara possible, and geared towards stopping discussion by smearing speakers such as Eva or annie, with the tar brush of “anti-semite.”
One minute eee is declaring all Jews to be Zionists, then when he comes across non Zionist Jews, he decides they are not jews.
a stab in the heart
“why did we destroy an entire country??”
Like it was the first time? As I remember, we didn’t leave Viet Nam and other Asian countries much improved after our sojourn there, either.
scenes from the ‘good war’:
link to google.ca
“As I remember … Viet Nam”
You are not supposed to remember. Too long ago. Doesn’t count, now.
Just remember the Holocaust.
I remember the eminent German historian Ernst Nolte saying Vietnam was as bad as the Holocaust, just more brutal. All hell broke loose: Holocaust denier
>> “… remember the Holocaust.”
It just rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it? :-) And it does wonders for the business that is Zio-supremacism.
Ernst Nolte actually said a lot of things like that. I believe he called the Allied bombing campaign “comparable” to the Holocaust. Sometimes it pays to interrogate people’s motives.
Historian Guenter Lewy, who has been called an extreme advocate of the uniqueness of the Holocaust, has not only written books denying that the treatment of the Gypsies and the Armenians constituted genocide, but has also written a book defending the American conduct of the war in Vietnam: America in Vietnam.
And what do your Zionist agenda motivated psychic powers tell you about Ernst Nolte’s motives, pray tell, Yossi?
“why did we destroy an entire country??”
++++ That was byproduct. Once they ruled Iraq from border to border, they stripped Ba’ath party members from all important posts. Police, army ( which was allready down ), city & county etc. municipal persons & posts.
Now, what happens when you strip police & army functionality. Result is chaos.
Rummy’s not haunted at all. When asked about his specially created agency stove-piping cherry-picked intelligence data to spread fear of Iraq WMD he responded (smirking), “Stove-piping? What does THAT mean?”
The flustered MSM interviewer had no cutting reply, and moved on. Rummy is as NAZI-like in mentality as one can be, considering the highly-educated, white collar top Nazi elite. Our MSM interviewers are at the least highly naive, at the most, incompetent or in the pocket of oliarchial influence, when it comes to the really BIG ISSUES. War. Israel. those dots don’t get connected in public by anyone wishing a career in the MSM.
Chris Matthew’s pretense at willlful ignorance and avoidance of helping America connect the dots with the Israel Lobby, Neocons, and their agenda makes him more an enabler of the Israel Lobby than a critical observer or someone helpful for the education and enlightenment of the public.
As such his opinion show is just space occupying-, enabling, and part of the problem rather being part of the solution. His crime is a the crime of ommission and coverup – essential services to the Israel Lobby. Matthews helps sustain the media culture of fear and intimidation that we in turn see Rachel Maddow and so many others succumb to.
So many times I have seen Mathhews come up to the line, look over it, and as if hit by a bolt of electricity shy away like someone who just saw a coiled up rattlesnake rattling at his lucrative future. A perfect success story for Israeli Lobby intimidation.
Why not start a jihad about the current Israeli Lobby/Neocon plans trying to gin up a war with Iran? – we know he’s lazy but he won’t even have to write a new script describing it since the Neocons are using the same one they used for Iraq
“Zero nuclear weapons, simply the possibility that he intended at some point to do that and then to find out that the director of intelligence is basically saying all the evidence they had is imprecise”
No Chris – we aren’t ‘all Neocons now’ and some of us never were.
Willful ignorance is the most maddening and the most inexcusable!!
Gingershot, a very excellent portrait of our country’s boyish, sharp little altar boy.
Correct me if im wrong, but i didnt see Hans Blix & UN armament commission mentioned. Who told that there is no proof of Saddam WMD program before the attack. Its like talking 9/11 twin towers and forgetting WTC 7.
link to guardian.co.uk
I just watched this German docu (Engl. subtitles) on 9/11 and the WOT.
Unbelievable
see for yourselves
link to video.google.com
Antidote. I dont know if you know this site, if you do then ignore :
link to ae911truth.org
They found thermites and nano thermites from the ash of WTC. And only explanation to this is that they were controlled demolition.
mig,
I’ve seen similar sites. My problem: you can tell me anything about the pros and cons of controlled demolition, I simply wouldn’t be able to assess the validity of the arguments. I’m not an engineer. I also know enough to realize that there is very little agreement on a lot of issues, be it in science or engineering or any other field of knowledge. I have enough academic titles to not be easily impressed by them, and you will always find ‘experts’ with impressive credentials on any side of any debate.
What I liked about the docu I posted was that it effectively debunks the official 9/11 story by the blatant implausibility of the ‘evidence’.
But thank you. I’ll consult my friends in engineering ;)
Antidote, please do consult your friends in engineering. There is nothing that happened that day that cannot be explained by the physics and thermodynamics of a hot kerosene fire weakening structural steel. But please do not encourage the 911 truther fools, they have their own sites dedicated to ghosts, ufos and such to play at.
The least credible part of the story is that Dubya was reading “My Pet Goat” to schoolkids. When did he get such skills?
There is nothing that happened that day that cannot be explained by the physics and thermodynamics of a hot kerosene fire weakening structural steel.
;-) Yeah, just like when those hot kerosene fires melt steel barbecues in the backyards of the land, and the Shuttle boosters (5600 F) melt the takeoff landing before it soars off into space. I particularly like the factoid that aluminum (plane) can pierce steel…I think that’s my favorite. Or maybe it’s the required 30 minutes at 3200 F necessary to incinerate a human body, according to NYS chief forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden, which is probably why they did find a few splinters of bone in the rubble.
The modern Germans have learned their history well, for example what Hitler did with the Reichstag fire. Modern Americans don’t usually know about how many wars we started under false flags to benefit our oliarchy. Nobody even mentions the same thing happening again towards war on Iran. Easy to dupe the masses.
europeans went thru the years of lead so all of them are familiar w/false flag operations. that is my understanding.
That’s not the only difference, annie. Americans have always had a more Orwellian relationship to the truth, going back to the colonial period. European Christians who were in daily and obvious conflict with their values and revolutionary ideals by staking their survival and prosperity (that which due to political oppression or religious persecution was not granted to them in Europe) on brutal slavery, massive ethnic cleansing and ethnic/religious chauvinism. The oppressed becoming oppressors while deluding themselves that they are doing something new and revolutionary, in line with Christian values. Under the circumstances, it was inevitable to develop some major collective blinders. Stuff needed to be swept under the proverbial rug in order to maintain the national myth that this is the greatest country ever, the most democratic, the land of the free, the pinnacle of civilization for which such sacrifice and self-deception was worthwhile after all. The mechanisms for doing this are merely applied to new human and geopolitical targets in different historical periods. Europeans have fewer illusions, and less need to maintain them. They know they started out as barbarians, and periodically returned to their roots
point taken antidote. my history is limited . still, it wasn’t until my awareness of the gladio network during the cold war i understood the depth of the false flag deceptions of the cia inside europe. and it seems like this is something every european knows.
i recommend everyone watch this bbc documentary w/interviews of numerous cia and italian operatives (heck, michael ledeen is even interviewed).
Why not start a jihad about the current Israeli Lobby/Neocon plans trying to gin up a war with Iran?
This is far more germane. The docs are available, including General Oded Tira’s spew in December 2006: link to ynetnews.com
And Norman Podhoretz who ends this long Commentary article The Case for Bombing Iran with: “As an American and as a Jew, I pray with all my heart that he will.”
link to commentarymagazine.com
The list of distinctly Israeli and Lobby screeds to bomb Iran are plentiful. This is what is newsworthy now, especially since the speciousness of the claims are so similar, and most people aren’t as familiar with the PNAC and Clean Break documents.
“I would say that it is naive not to think that these Jewish names are intended to placate a Democratic Party political establishment that is largely Jewish.”
Or, both guys just happen to be Jews, and you know, did well wherever they were and earned these appointment. Not everyone has the obsession with the Jews that you do, Phil.
there’s a lot of ‘just happen to be Jews’ going on in washington.
At the height of things, 14 out of 100 Senators were Jewish — that’s 2% of the population with 14% representation in what can be argued as the most powerful entity in American politics — things either move with the Senate, or they don’t move at all.
Conversely, African Americans are at least 14% of the population. At most, at any time, they have held exactly one Senate seat.
That’s one 2% minority with a 14% share of representation, while a 14% minority has at most 1%. If they’re lucky.
That doesn’t happen by chance.
“That doesn’t happen by chance.”
No, it’s part of the conspiracy you read in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, right?
What exactly are you looking for, an apology?
Sorry the Jews are too successful for you.
hops you are attempting to stop a conversation about the american establishment by waving the bloody shirt of antisemitism. imagine for one moment that so many palestinians were named to positions affecting policy. wd we be allowed to even talk about it?
I’d like you to explain to African Americans, hophmi, why you are, as a matter of ethnicity, so much more qualified to be Senator than any of them could be.
“I’d like you to explain to African Americans, hophmi, why you are, as a matter of ethnicity, so much more qualified to be Senator than any of them could be.”
Your race-baiting is not fooling anyone, Chaos. I never said as much.
“hops you are attempting to stop a conversation about the american establishment by waving the bloody shirt of antisemitism.”
Well, what do you call it when person after person here suggests that there are too many Jews in power? There is a tremendous amount of antisemitism on your site Phil. That you choose to ignore it, or at times, stoke the flames, is your failing. You want to have a conversation, but you want to base it on assumptions that reek of bigotry.
“imagine for one moment that so many palestinians were named to positions affecting policy. wd we be allowed to even talk about it?”
Would you be allowed to talk about it? I don’t see why not. But if the entire conversation were about how there were too many Palestinians and how this was a nefarious thing, you wouldn’t just let it pass, would you?
And you’re ignoring the fact that the practice of claiming there are too many Jews in power has a long and negative history that you are resurrecting here by permitting crude broadsides that you would never allow for any other minority group.
Your dodging the question. The sad fact of the matter, hophmi, is that you’re a Jewish supremacist and you believe that African Americans lack some quality that your people have, or else you wouldn’t insist that the polarization between your enfranchisement and their disenfranchisement was merely a question of merit.
You don’t believe that all men were created equal. Your statement contradicts that openly.
And you’re ignoring the fact that the practice of claiming there are too many Jews in power has a long and negative history that you are resurrecting here by permitting crude broadsides that you would never allow for any other minority group.
let’s be honest about it hophmi. this is not about ‘too many jews in power’. this is really about too much support for that little criminal state and the focus of our foreign policy protecting it. it is about too much influence against our national interest. it is about a war on terror and islamophobia. it is about many of those very same jews who write about islamophobia having access to the white house. it’s about incitement against arabs, not incitement against jews. so try looking at what’s happening and drop the jewish victimhood handle.
ps, get your eyes off the long and negative history being allegedly ‘resurrected’ and look at the drumbeat of alleged arab hatred being propagated and nurtured day in and day out (like on the jinsa report on the front page here today). look who’s being bombed by our tax dollars. look at who’s dying. there are victims here and it’s not the jewish community ( who are often coveted and protected while some members are spewing forth horrendous lies completely against everything this country and martin stand for). it’s disgusting. so let’s stop this focus on muslims and arabs and the middle east. and get your eyes on the EXPANSION OF ISRAEL WE PROTECT, which is against our national interest.
and if you don’t like it here leave. there are other blogs.
“too many Jews in power has a long and negative history”
Sorry, Hoppo, but if “the Jews” are “a people” or “a nation” or any of that, and devoted to their own “Jewish” interests than I guess any country or person has the right to decide if that is a threat to them, and any country has the right to decide if they will accept this alien nation in their midst, working against them. Perfectly reasonable.
Now of course, if Judaism was just a religion with some cultural ways-of-doing and talking attached (and the religion didn’t involve grinding up babies for Matzoh) then counting Jews would be a function of religious bigotry. Unfortunately, forming a “Jewish State” pretty much closes off that route.
Funny, Zionists don’t seem to think there is anything about consequences which applies to them.
Succinctly to the point, Mooser. It’s amazing how many Zionists think they can repeat anti-semitic tropes about Jews and not understand the consequences of their repetition.
“Sorry, Hoppo, but if “the Jews” are “a people” or “a nation” or any of that, and devoted to their own “Jewish” interests than I guess any country or person has the right to decide if that is a threat to them, and any country has the right to decide if they will accept this alien nation in their midst, working against them. Perfectly reasonable.”
Well, it’s nice that you decided to actually respond to something rather than make a stupid joke, but unfortunately, the relevancy is not matched by the intellect.
Have you not heard that it is illegal in this country to discriminate on the basis of national origin? Discriminating against Jews because they choose to define themselves as a nation is not any more reasonable than discriminating against Greek-Americans or English-American or Lebanese-Americans or Iraqi-Americans or Chinese-Americans or anyone else for doing so.
“Your dodging the question. The sad fact of the matter, hophmi, is that you’re a Jewish supremacist and you believe that African Americans lack some quality that your people have, or else you wouldn’t insist that the polarization between your enfranchisement and their disenfranchisement was merely a question of merit.
You don’t believe that all men were created equal.”
This is tiresome.
I have taken great pains to explain to you my thoughts on this matter, and you continue to claim I say things which I expressly do not. Your race-baiting is disgusting, as is your habit of libelling me by accusing me of saying things that I expressly disclaim and do not say.
“and if you don’t like it here leave. there are other blogs.”
You’d love that, wouldn’t you?
Get a grip. I’m not going anywhere.
You’d love that, wouldn’t you?
Get a grip. I’m not going anywhere.
answering yourself? you’re the one who said : There is a tremendous amount of antisemitism on your site Phil. That you choose to ignore it, or at times, stoke the flames, is your failing. You want to have a conversation, but you want to base it on assumptions that reek of bigotry. hence i reminded you you’re free to leave.
as for me, why should i be lovin’ it if you left? just another opportunity to shine that mirror in your eyes. that’s what i’m here for hops, your arguments are not a problem for me.
“No, it’s part of the conspiracy you read in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, right?”
Everybody knows the Protocols are a forgery. Hitler knew as much (check passage in Mein Kampf). The argument made by Hitler, and ever since, is: ‘We know it is an anti-semitic fraud, but it still rings true’. This is the recurrent problem: Jews being over-represented in positions of substantial economic and political power. Jews bragging about their achievements in this regard (“Sorry the Jews are too successful for you”), then crying ‘anti-semitism’ when non-Jews point it out. If you object to the Protocols, don’t use them as an instruction manual.
hophmi “Your race-baiting is disgusting”
hahahah – chutzpah!
oh boy, hophmi, yer a joke, your ever-increasing tendency to claim that you find something said in response to you to be ‘disgusting’ or ‘offensive’ or even ‘hateful’ is comical, considering that the vast majority of what you post here can usually be classified under one of those 3 headings
“There is a tremendous amount of antisemitism on your site Phil. That you choose to ignore it, or at times, stoke the flames, is your failing. You want to have a conversation, but you want to base it on assumptions that reek of bigotry.” “hence i reminded you you’re free to leave. ”
As I’ve said before, I don’t revel in getting validation by dittoheads who agree with everything I say.
dittoheads who agree with everything I say.
the frog? i rarely agree w/anything you say.
“The argument made by Hitler, and ever since, is: ‘We know it is an anti-semitic fraud, but it still rings true’.”
So you adopt Hitler’s arguments now?
“This is the recurrent problem: Jews being over-represented in positions of substantial economic and political power.”
I don’t view it as a problem. I view people who view it as a problem as a problem. They’re called antisemites.
It’s nice to see some honesty in here, though.
straw man, as usual
“straw man, as usual”
Antidote looking for a place where antisemitism is socially acceptable, as usual.
hophmi,
to be honest: there are a lot of Jews I don’t like, and you are one of them, from my online impression. There are a lot of Jews I do like. And that’s pretty much how I feel about every other ethnic or religious group. I’m fine with that.
I therefore do not personally have a problem with Jews being ‘over-represented’ anywhere. Depends on who they are, and what they do and stand for.
But I wasn’t talking about my personal opinions in the post above. I was addressing the recurrent problem of ‘Jewish power’ as it has been addressed frequently, in different contexts and countries, without my personal involvement, and at times when I wasn’t even alive. If you can’t tell the difference between one issue and another, that’s your problem, not mine.
“Have you not heard that it is illegal in this country to discriminate on the basis of national origin?”
As non-lawyer, I would say that is irrelevant. The suggested discrimination is not on the basis of origin but on the claim of current status as a “nation” combined with devotion to the interests of that “nation”.
If Greek-Americans or Chinese-Americans declare that they belong to some “nation” other than the United States, and were devoted to the interests of that “nation”, then they too should face the same scrutiny.
“I don’t view it as a problem. I view people who view it as a problem as a problem. They’re called antisemites.
It’s nice to see some honesty in here, though.”
Since we’re on the subject of honesty here I was wondering if you could give me an answer to the following question:
Do you have a drop of semitic blood in your body?
Hophmi,
“And you’re ignoring the fact that the practice of claiming there are too many Jews in power has a long and negative history that you are resurrecting here by permitting crude broadsides that you would never allow for any other minority group.”
Bullshit. You haven’t been on this site as long as I have. Phil has no problem taking on other minority groups when he cites an injustice, or wants to discuss it. You just want special treatment because you’re Jewish, and huff and puff and want to blow this house down when you don’t get your way.
Mooser,
Funny, Zionists don’t seem to think there is anything about consequences which applies to them.
Ain’t that the truth. And then they complain about the future they get. So much for IQ.
“than make a stupid joke”, hoppo? The first stupid joke by mooser I have yet to see. Please point one. Btw, if a joke is stupid, just don’t laught ok? And then, it is not a joke either of course.
Nobody here is discriminating against on the basis of national origin, Hophmi. You need to understand what you read–this includes Mooser’s use of quote marks. They are discriminating against the political ideology of Zionism. You are the one here who continually conflates Zionism with all jews the world over, living and dead. You use memory of the innocent victims of Auschwitz to perpetuate
and justify Israel’s daily present and oppressive de facto policy against the equally innocent Palestian people. No matter how many Jews (& non-Jews) on this blog try to point this out to you, you are impervious. You are the one here who thus constantly believes that two wrongs make a right.
“there’s a lot of ‘just happen to be Jews’ going on in washington.”
Do you realize how hateful that sounds?
but hopster what’s going on, really? it’s not jsut by chance that so many jews are named to these positions, it reflects an incredible moment in jewish history which i applaud by and large, except as it impacts middle east policy…
It was neither hateful nor foolish to point out that at one point Washington DC’s positions were held almost exclusively by white Europeans. It’s not hateful to point out the facts. In fact, until that was confronted it was impossible to get anyone outside of the circle of privilege access to the levers of government at all.
The facts are, Jewish men and women have a demonstrative privilege in American politics nowadays.
in the early 60s the great Digby Baltzell, born to that patrician class, wrote a great book on the protestant establishment saying that exclusive networks were denying access and talent to energetic people who didn’t fit the ethnic mold. he specifically mentioned jews. a great thing, too; we got in. but there is always the issue of kinship networks in hiring, with any establishment, and of course the israel support racket
“but hopster what’s going on, really? it’s not jsut by chance that so many jews are named to these positions, it reflects an incredible moment in jewish history which i applaud by and large, except as it impacts middle east policy…”
No, it’s certainly not by chance. People have to achieve things in life to get to these positions. But I think what you’re saying, and you’ve said more explicitly before, is that there is some kind of extra-nefarious nepotism going on.
Jews as a group are high-achieving. So are Indians. So are Asians. After a couple of generations, you’ll see plenty of them in positions of power as well. Basically, people from cultures that emphasize education and hard work do well in this society. It’s not rocket science.
hopster let me concede your point re achievement; you dont think its problematic when Politico, the leading sheet describing how the US establishment works, cites as one of the new ambassador to Israel’s most significant qualifications that he is a “mensch.” Who gets to be a mensch? Could Chas Freeman or Rashid Khalidi, both wonderful men, ever be a mensch in these folks’ eeys?
Jews as a group are high-achieving. So are Indians. So are Asians. After a couple of generations, you’ll see plenty of them in positions of power as well.
ahh, last i heard asians and indians have already been here for way more than a couple generations.
I ask you again. What is it you think you and certain ethnic groups have, that African Americans lack, hophmi? Explain it to us.
“you dont think its problematic when Politico, the leading sheet describing how the US establishment works, cites as one of the new ambassador to Israel’s most significant qualifications that he is a “mensch.” Who gets to be a mensch? Could Chas Freeman or Rashid Khalidi, both wonderful men, ever be a mensch in these folks’ eeys?”
I think it’s an example of someone using one of the many Yiddish words that has worked its way into the English language.
The bottom line is, Phil, you and other here see someone like Dan Shapiro and first thing you focus on is “Jew.” That he happens to have gotten his degree in Middle Eastern politics from Harvard, served as a staffer on the House Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Europe and Middle East, advised two Presidents on Middle East affairs, and speaks fluent Hebrew is not mentioned by you. He’s also served in the UAE, by the way.
So yeah, I find the way you seize on the ethnicity of Jews in power while leaving out their qualifications problematic. I don’t think you’d tolerate this way of thinking about any other group.
“ahh, last i heard asians and indians have already been here for way more than a couple generations.”
Yes, but for the most part they have only been politically active as a group in the last generation. The point is that Indians and Asians are overrepresented in our elite institutions of higher learning just as Jews are. In New York City, the gifted and talented program is something like thirty-five percent Asian, far in excess of the percentage of Asians in the city. Should they choose to pursue political positions of influence, you are likely to see more of them in high office.
for the most part they have only been politically active as a group in the last generation. The point is that Indians and Asians are overrepresented in our elite institutions of higher learning just as Jews are.
no , the point is that Indians and Asians maybe overrepresented in our elite institutions of higher learning just as Jews are but for the most part they are not overrepresented politically as a group just as Jews are. why might that be? don’t confuse political activity with political power. people don’t become politically powerful simply as a result of being politically active.
The membership of the gifted and talented program don’t control any budget committees in Congress.
hophmi, Jews consistently were the most highly educated group in the US until about 20 years ago when the Palestinians residing here claimed top honors.
I found that interesting and amusing and gratifying …in several ways.
the exact phrase used was “badass mensch”, popi. so don’t be all amok about it.
“I ask you again. What is it you think you and certain ethnic groups have, that African Americans lack, hophmi? Explain it to us.”
And I tell you again, I never asserted that Jews have something that African-Americans lack.
If you’re asserting that I’m denying a certain white privilege, let me state here and now that I do not deny that Jews benefit from a certain white privilege in this society, but I reject the notion that there is anything particularly Jewish about it. Indeed, Bobby Jindal is the governor of Louisiana, a pretty conservative state. He’s of Indian descent. Gary Locke was recently Governor of Washington; he’s of Asian descent. The Governor of Masschusetts, a state that has had its share of racial problems, is Black. The President of the United States is Black. Things are changing, and white privilege is not a good, fair, or accurate explanation of either Jewish success at being elected to high office or comparative African-American failure at it.
If your question is why African-Americans are underrepresented in federal elected office, particularly in the Senate (African-Americans make up around 9.5% of the House), I can give you my take on it.
Institutional racism definitely plays a role. The destruction of the Black family unit caused by slavery compounded by Jim Crow is something the African-American community still hasn’t recovered from. The confinement of African-Americans to urban ghettos in the 1950s and 1960s is something that has very real repercussions today. Despite the horror of the Holocaust, which certainly tore apart Jewish families, it was, thank G-d, not so long as to disgorge Jewish tradition and culture completely. So afterward, we were able to move on and pick up the pieces. It is very different from something that goes on for 400 years.
One serious problem is the lack of respect for knowledge and education that seems to prevail in the ghetto. I have a close relative who teaches at an inner-city school that is virtually all Black. Where I come from, smart kids are treasured and encouraged. When they get home, they are told to do their homework and rewarded appropriately for their scholastic achievements. And when it comes to the standardized testing that is unfortunately increasingly a way of measuring things in this society, they do what is necessary to make sure kids ace the test (and in the Asian community, where people come from countries where extra-academic enrichment is basically a social requirement, this is even more pronounced). And where I come from, smart kids make up a sizable portion of student body. Smart people have little trouble finding one another.
In schools like the one my close relative teaches in, they are a small, isolated minority and they are bullied mercilessly in a place that is institutionally dysfunctional and unsafe to begin with. Many come from broken, dysfunctional families where educational aspiration is not always valued. I think this plays a significant role in the lack of African-Americans in positions of power.
Jews have, historically, as a community, elevated our brightest to positions of power and influence. Education has long been paramount. In a society that is relatively meritocratic, those who value education the most will get ahead. I believe that is the principle reason Jews have done well in America, particularly in the last 40 years. And I think, in all honesty, African-Americans are starting to do better. But if you want to nail me down on what the differences are – that’s my analysis.
“an incredible moment in jewish history which i applaud by and large, except as it impacts middle east policy”
ROTFLMSJAO!!! Cause except for the ME, all those privileged Jews are devoted to justice for all and a hand up to the oppressed! Yes sir, we get this Israel thing straightened out and we will be batting 1.000!
Jews have, historically, as a community, elevated our brightest to positions of power and influence.
You know, given the intellectual gifts, or, more to the point, the lack of same, of most of the US power elite, your statement really doesn’t come off as a compliment but as an insult.
“ROTFLMSJAO!!! Cause except for the ME, all those privileged Jews are devoted to justice for all and a hand up to the oppressed! Yes sir, we get this Israel thing straightened out and we will be batting 1.000!”
ROTFLMSWAO! I liked that, too! Your response is good, but I would refer Phil to MRW’s post at the top of the page to get an idea of how the “meritocracy” is in danger of being viewed by the masses. As Balkanized as America is at this point, I’m not sure that anything like a directed mass anger could form. I know it’s hard to believe, but few people are as satisfied with the performance of the elites as Phil is. The nation is failing its citizens in every way possible, and our major downside relates to Israelis and Palestinians? Really??
“That he happens to have gotten his degree in Middle Eastern politics from Harvard, served as a staffer on the House Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Europe and Middle East, advised two Presidents on Middle East affairs, and speaks fluent Hebrew is not mentioned by you. He’s also served in the UAE, by the way. ”
Don’t you think it at all odd that someone who supposedly has all this objectively awesome Middle East experience never bothered to learn Arabic, the main language spoken in the area?? Or, by “Middle East” does he (and perhaps you) just mean “Israel”??
And if that is his view, why shouldn’t that be of concern to an American, seeing as how America has intersts in the area that are separate and apart from those of Israel, and, in many ways, are opposite of those Israel.
Or should he get a pass because he’s Jewish?
“Jews have, historically, as a community, elevated our brightest to positions of power and influence.”
And a lifetime membership in the Max Hochstim Society!
Jesus, what a load of unsupported racist crap, hophmi.
And not a supporting fact for any of it.
“Don’t you think it at all odd that someone who supposedly has all this objectively awesome Middle East experience never bothered to learn Arabic, the main language spoken in the area?? Or, by “Middle East” does he (and perhaps you) just mean “Israel”?? ”
No, not really. Not everyone learns Arabic. And he’s being posted to Israel, not Jordan.
“And if that is his view, why shouldn’t that be of concern to an American, seeing as how America has intersts in the area that are separate and apart from those of Israel, and, in many ways, are opposite of those Israel.”
I see no evidence that he believe that the Middle East is just Israel. He was posted to the UAE. The A stands for Arab.
“Jesus, what a load of unsupported racist crap, hophmi.
And not a supporting fact for any of it.”
Do you understand what a racist is? The question called for my opinion on why Jews were successful in America. I offer an historical analysis. You, apparently, believe positive statements about the Jewish attitude toward learning and education are “racist crap.” You are one messed-up dude.
But I forgot. You’re ignorant of Jewish history. Well, in the old country, the smartest people generally were the ones who were encouraged to study in yeshiva and thus became the rabbis, ie, gained the positions of power and influence. The legacy is that learning has always been valued in the Jewish community.
I see that unfortunately, you appear not to have benefitted from that tradition. Too bad, so sad.
“You’re ignorant of Jewish history.”
++++ Which version of it ?
“No, not really. Not everyone learns Arabic.”
But some do, don’t they? And wouldn’t someone who spoke the main language in the area be more qualified for the post than Shapiro??
So how can you find the discussion of his ethnicity suspect, accusing people of ignoring his qualifications, when his qualfications are spotty for that area, where career diplomats are passed over, and where his support appears to be driven, in large part, by his ethnicity and his adherence to the philosophy of the pro-Israeli lobby? Do you really not see a disconnection there?
“And he’s being posted to Israel, not Jordan.”
So? Don’t half the population under the rule of the Israelis speak Arabic? Does he not want to speak to them? Read their newspapers? Understand their thoughts? Or is it only the Jews that are important?
“I see no evidence that he believe that the Middle East is just Israel. He was posted to the UAE. The A stands for Arab.”
Yeah, and unlike many well-qualified career diplomats, he couldn’t speak to those Arabs in their native language.
“But some do, don’t they? And wouldn’t someone who spoke the main language in the area be more qualified for the post than Shapiro?? ”
In the first place, he’s being posted as Ambassador to Israel, where the main language is Hebrew. In the second place, if you’d like to show how US diplomats are always the most qualified people for their jobs save the Middle East, please do so.
“So how can you find the discussion of his ethnicity suspect, accusing people of ignoring his qualifications, when his qualfications are spotty for that area, where career diplomats are passed over, and where his support appears to be driven, in large part, by his ethnicity and his adherence to the philosophy of the pro-Israeli lobby? Do you really not see a disconnection there? ”
When you look at Dan Shapiro’s resume and the first thing that pops up is “Jew,” you’ve got a bigotry problem. When you call his qualifications “spotty”, you’ve got a reading and comprehension problem. When you fail to understand that most ambassadors are political appointments, and thus career diplomats are regularly passed over, you’ve got a knowledge problem. When you put this all together and conclude that a guy who has a background in Middle East affairs, speaks the language of country he’s posted to, has a background on the Hill and a background in the White House, and you conclude, “It’s because he’s a Jew and a Zionist”, you’ve got an analytical problem.
I see no evidence that he believe that the Middle East is just Israel. He was posted to the UAE. The A stands for Arab.
Where knowing Hebrew and no Arabic is a big, big plus right? You’re flailing again hophmi.
Hophmi – not just in Washington, BTW.
Here’s a case study fro you – his name is Rahm Emanuel, who just gave a master class on how to buy a mayorship of a major American town. Qualifications were not necessary. Neither was brilliance. Just connections and access to money. There was a post here on the staggering amounts of funds contributed to Rahm’s campaign, practically for asking.Mostly from rich American jewish donors. Over a factor of 10 more war chest raised than the nearest candidate. No one had a chance challenging this barreling train, and it was all smooth sailing for Rahm once they got the judge of choice to declare residency as immaterial. The people of Chicago? absolutely secondary.
So what we have is a spectacle not of merit but of pure influence peddling, known in siome circles as graft. Rahm had virtually no credentials worth mentioning for the post and he did a god-awful job on his previous post as a COS). Smirking all the way to his newly acquired office is the penultimate operator, an arrogant tribal exploiter of all things petty and selfish. A man who never heard of vision but knew how to grease the wheels and make the most of connections and networks. If most of those were jewish, so be it and damn the consequences. All that after the incalculable damage this mean little man did to the sitting president, and having really messed up the grounds leading up to the disastrous fall elections.
You can consider him talented. Most of us simply see him and his big money bag donors as the epitome of corruption. Alas, it’s only going to get worse with the CU action, because guess who fills up nearly 1/2 of the ranks of the Fortune 500? Money and influence and tribal networking is how all too many Jewish politicians and bankers make it. And media types. and University presidents. One hand greases the other – isn’t that how it works? No need for conspiracy theories a la prtocols either. It’s enough to just read the papers since no one even bothers to hide their tracks.
Eventually, these chickens may well come home to roost. Personally I think we are merely another $50.-100./barrel, and a few more crazy Israeli atrocities away from calamity, and I do fear that when the avalanche comes it’ll sweep all in its path, as avalanches are wont to do. The righteous and the guilty as sin. Perhaps the powers-that-be will take Rahmmy as the sacrificial virgin to stave off the angry gods?
“Where knowing Hebrew and no Arabic is a big, big plus right? You’re flailing again hophmi.”
Change the subject, much? The assertion was that Dan Shapiro thinks of Middle East only. That is demonstrably untrue given his service to the UAE. There is a general shortage of Arabic speakers in the State Department. That is not a problem confined to Jewish employees.
“Over a factor of 10 more war chest raised than the nearest candidate. No one had a chance challenging this barreling train, and it was all smooth sailing for Rahm once they got the judge of choice to declare residency as immaterial. The people of Chicago? absolutely secondary.”
Yes, well, people with name recognition tend to win races like this. And oh yes, he had a few qualifications, like a career in politics, including stints as a Congressman from Illinois and years and years of service in the White House. If his name had been Rod Smith and his religion Christianity – he still would have been elected.
Remember Haley Barbour? Spent his career as a political operative. Then he wanted an office. So he ran for Governor of Mississippi. Not a Jew last I checked.
“Rahm had virtually no credentials worth mentioning for the post and he did a god-awful job on his previous post as a COS).”
Yes, G-d awful. He only contributed to getting Congress to pass more legislation than any Congress in seven decades. Awful.
“an arrogant tribalist who knew how to grease the wheels and make the most of connections and networks.”
See this is what is so disgusting. You call him a tribalist – based on what?
“That, mind you, is how all too many Jewish politicians and bankers make it. One hand greases the other. No need for conspiracy theories either. It’s enough to just read the papers since no one even bothers to hide their tracks.”
Again, based on WHAT? You say disgusting antisemitic things, and you provide no cites, nothing other than this garden variety radical left blather. That indicates that you feel comfortable saying it here, which means that this blog has turned into a place for antisemites to gather.
“he’s being posted as Ambassador to Israel, where the main language is Hebrew”
So? Fully half the people under the control of the Isrealis speak Arabic, a language which, if he had these incredible Middle East qualfications, he would have bothered to learn at some point, right?
“When you look at Dan Shapiro’s resume and the first thing that pops up is ‘Jew,’ you’ve got a bigotry problem.”
Strawman. No one but you is saying this.
“When you call his qualifications ‘spotty’, you’ve got a reading and comprehension problem.”
Baloney. I said his qualifications were spotty “for this area.” Meaning that if he is such a wonderfully qualified Middle East expert — not just an Israel expert, but a Middle East expert — then he would have learned Arabic. The fact that he is satisifed with knowing a marginal language in his supposed area of expertise does call into question the extent of his actual qualifications.
If someone from China claimed to be an expert on the Americas, and chose to be fluent in French (as opposed to Spanish or English), one could rightly question that claim of expertise. Same here.
“When you fail to understand that most ambassadors are political appointments, and thus career diplomats are regularly passed over, you’ve got a knowledge problem.”
You are the one who suggested that Shapiro is the super-qualified candidate and pretty much implied that anyone who questioned whether this appointment was simply political payback to the Zio-lobby was a Jew hater. So which is it? Is he qualified or is it a political appointment?
Arabic, Woody?
Why would anyone in the US establishment care what Arabs say or write?
“it reflects an incredible moment in jewish history which i applaud by and large, except as it impacts middle east policy…”
That ‘incredible moment’ was achieved no later than the early 20th c, amid widespread anti-semitism, particularly in Germany and the US. If you go by counting ‘Jewish heads’, Versailles, due to the high number of Jewish delegates (including Wilson’s diplomatic entourage), was correctly dubbed the ‘kosher conference’, and the Weimar Republic the ‘Judenrepublik’.
The author of the Weimar constitution was Hugo Preuss, a German Jew and minister of the Weimar Republic. I don’t believe in ‘counting Jewish heads’, and there is no question that Preuss, despite being, posthumously, targeted by the Nazis as one of the powerful Jews who brought down Germany was a German patriot whose opinions on the Versailles Treaty as illegal and disastrous did not differ from the opinions subsequently espoused by Hitler.
link to query.nytimes.com
I do find your argument – I applaud Jewish emancipation/power, except for its impact on ME policy — to be as absurd as the one made by the Nazis with regard to Preuss and others. It poses an artificial and wholly unwarranted rift between being German/American and Jewish American/German on the basis of an equally unwarranted definition of Jewish/German/American values and national interest.
“Why would anyone in the US establishment care what Arabs say or write?”
Yeah, given the state of the world, such a skill would NEVER come in handy…
I see no evidence that he believe that the Middle East is just Israel. He was posted to the UAE. The A stands for Arab.
Where he used his perfect Hebrew with equal aplomb.
Danaa,
All that after the incalculable damage this mean little man did to the sitting president, and having really messed up the grounds leading up to the disastrous fall elections.
Incalculable damage this mean little man did to the TWO sitting presidents. (It ain’t good English, but you know what I mean)
He pushed NAFTA over the goal-line (his words), and he pushed through China Most Favored Nation status for his Goldman Sachs friends in 1999, whereupon he got that cushy $19 million reward for three years at another investment house as soon as he left Clinton’s office.
Change the subject, much?The assertion was that Dan Shapiro thinks of Middle East only. That is demonstrably untrue given his service to the UAE.
Woody wondered if Shapiro thought the ME only meant Israel since he doesn’t know Arabic and your assertion was that because he was Ambassador to Israel it didn’t matter that he spoke no Arabic, only Hebrew. And then tried to show some kind of greater qualification on his part because he was posted to UAE. (He didn’t “give his service” to the UAE. He gave it to the US. ) But that only makes his lack of knowledge of Arabic all that much more a deficit. Hebrew is not a particularly useful language in the UAE.
There is a general shortage of Arabic speakers in the State Department. That is not a problem confined to Jewish employees.
No one said it was. But you claimed Shapiro had these great qualifications as a Middle East expert but he has no knowledge of Arabic. That’s the subject. No one has changed it.
“Jews as a group are high-achieving”. What happened to the primary pre-write mental check: “would & could you write the opposite too?”. Blacks as a group are… Jews as a group are not …
hophmi – see comment b y MRW about Rahm’s shenanigans during his stint as a congressman (thanks for the details, MRW). To which I’d add the mess that he hoisted upon democrats in the form of the Blue Dogs, most of whom are now mercifully gone from the house (to be replaced by tea partities….)..
To defend Rahm you bring up Barbour? that’s it? oh yes, there’s the “name recognition” factor. Well, Shirley Moss-Braun had it too – in spades – and was considerably better qualified to be mayor than Rahm, if commitment to Chicago city activities were the yard stick. Yet no jewish donors did she find, just a few measly “grass roots” contributions.
You are quick to accuse people of anti-semitism (are you jewish BTW?). In this case you hurl stink bombs because I mention that which is as plain as snow – the contributions to Rahm WERE in large part from Jewish sources, and certainly ALL from wealthy individuals who will be expecting their pound of flesh in due course. So, how many blacks contributed to Rahm? how much support from labor vs how much corporate support? how many Chicago citizens supported him or backed him? the sad truth is that it is easy to win elections in certain areas in the US when one has the money. And Chicago has always been a hot-bed of influence peddling and political clout bought by the highest bidder, in which case, Rahm is just one in a series of corrupt politicians there (not for nothing is Chcago known as the mafia city).
Truw, money didn’t work for Fiorina or that e-bay executive (whose name I blissfully happened to forget already – no room in brain), but then note that neither was supported by the jewish establishment the way Rahm was in Chicago. In California the Jewish money includes Holywood money and law firm money, much if that went to Brown who California democrats are generally comfortable with. And that includes the majority of state’s Jewish population, who are mostly democrats.
The story of money in American politics is unfortunately pretty black and white, though the story of Jewish money is more nuanced since many of the wealthy jewish donors, like Saban, are aligned with democratic party politics. Nonetheless, in Rahm’s case, the nuance all but disappears. That was my point.
For hurling your silly accusations around you deserve to be banned for a while from this blog and I have reported your comment as offensive. I believe most commenters here would agree with the troll classification.
“You are quick to accuse people of anti-semitism (are you jewish BTW?). ”
I am not quick to accuse people of antisemitism. I make the charge where I believe it’s warranted.
“So, how many blacks contributed to Rahm? how much support from labor vs how much corporate support? how many Chicago citizens supported him or backed him”
I imagine many blacks backed him. He did win the election. They voted for him. They didn’t have to.
I have no idea what the labor/corporate breakup is. But once again, there is nary a major-office candidate in this country who does not rely on corporate contributions in some way shape or form, so bringing up Rahm’s Jewishness, as if this made a difference, is bigoted.
As far as Chicago citizens, once again: this was an election with a number of candidates. Chicagoans voted for Rahm.
“the sad truth is that it is easy to win elections in certain areas in the US when one has the money.”
It is. But again, you assert that there is a Jewish element to this when in fact, it is a universal truth in politics in general, and American politics in particular. You need money to run. No dispute about that. Again, there’s nothing “Jewish” about this, and it is that assertion I find objectionable.
“The story of money in American politics is unfortunately pretty black and white, though the story of Jewish money is more nuanced since many of the wealthy jewish donors, like Saban, are aligned with democratic party politics. Nonetheless, in Rahm’s case, the nuance all but disappears. That was my point.”
Again. You speak as if Jews provided most of the money in politics. It is patently untrue, and even if it were, there would be nothing whatsoever objectionable about it. There are a lot more Christian donors than Jewish ones in this country. I don’t see you crying about them.
“For hurling your silly accusations around you deserve to be banned for a while from this blog and I have reported your comment as offensive. I believe most commenters here would agree with the troll classification.”
I’m sorry (well, not really that sorry) that you are so misguided and bigoted. One day, perhaps you’ll realize the error of your ways and apologize.
Clearly
am I allowed under your rules to talk about the Christian right and what I believe to be its negative role in our politics? or is that bigoted?
am I allowed to talk about Scalia and Roberts and Sotomayor being Catholic and there being three Jews on the court too?
etc
There are a lot more Christian donors than Jewish ones in this country.
the amount of donors isnt’s what matters, it’s the amount those donors donate. the supreme court has just insured the number of donors will be become essentially meaningless anyway.
you’re being daft.
“am I allowed to talk about Scalia and Roberts and Sotomayor being Catholic and there being three Jews on the court too?”
If all you have to say is that they’re Catholic and Jewish and it’s a problem, then no, I’m sorry, you have a problem.
If you want to talk about substantive positions they’ve taken and why you disagree with, that’s fine. But you can’t just say hey, there are three Jews and six Catholics, and that’s a problem. That’s discriminatory and reeks of bigotry.
As far as the Christian right goes, I would argue that this situation differs in at least three major ways. The first is that Christians are the majority in this country, as well as, historically, the perpetrators of most of the historical discrimination in this country, particularly in the South. The second is that the Christian right comprises something on the order of 20 to 25% of the population.
But the third, and most important, is that, particularly in the last 25 to 30 years, the Christian right has made no secret of its political and legislative agenda, and repeatedly lobbies openly to enact legislation in its own name that reflects that agenda. Indeed, it’s called the Christian RIGHT, not simply, “the Christians.” The RIGHT reflects a political agenda. When you criticize the Christian RIGHT, you’re usually criticizing the RIGHT part, not the Christian part.
Phil, it’s very simple. We don’t judge people based on the color of their skin or their religious grouping. We judge them based on the content of their character. You repeatedly fail to do this when it comes to the Jews you criticize, and you have created a community here of people who do the same. This does not help your cause.
“you’re being daft.”
You’re being a bigot. Checking the religion of the donor and making conclusions based on that alone, as you are doing, is the practice of bigots.
the difficulty is that your categories in the end would shut down the lifeblood of democracy which is open discussion, in this case of what madison would have characterized as a devoted faction that is corrupting our system. are they the jewish right, or likudnik Jews? yes. they are. and me and adam horowitz and many other jewish writers here give the lie to the idea that all jews support zionist project.
you valorize criticism of christians because of the history of discrimination. we see a history of hateful discrimination in the Jewish State. And the difficulty for me is that when Dershowitz says that it is the sacred mission of American Jews to support that state, and when even Jewish liberals are unable to criticize the state out of some sense of allegiance (relatives of mine, say, or famously per Leon Golub who explained, what is a jewish artist, an artist who can never talk about israel) to the larger community, and when goldstone is excommunicated by some jewish groups because of his criticisms, then Jews like myself feel an urgency in analyzing the commandments inside the jewish community that are barring this discussion. as you know, many jews regard israel as the greatst achievement of the jews in modern times, per ezra mendelsohn in Modern Jewish Politics book, a diminution of the american integrationist current in jewish thought that i am part of.
dont have time now, but you really are shutting down debate. the mere fact of the jewish presence on the SuCo was actually an element in the coverage. free speech means free speech. you’re policing it in these moralistic ways aimed at stopping people from imagining different futures based on discussion. when i think that a great achievement since the gentleman’s agreement was, Thsi society requires the energies of Jews, let us end that discrimination; and great privilege has resulted, and we are the wealthiest group by religion in the u.s. And all this privilege demands reflection… as it is, you would confine me to the tired themes of my first 45 years, ones i also propagated in a lot of journalism, when i went out to find bad goyim, and frankly i just dont find that so interesting as the fact that israelis kill a 63 year old man in his bed at 3 am in the occupied territories and my entire community except for the incredible JVP organization has nothing to say about it.
“the difficulty is that your categories in the end would shut down the lifeblood of democracy which is open discussion, in this case of what madison would have characterized as a devoted faction that is corrupting our system.”
In what way does this shut down discussion? You’re being lazy. There are perfectly non-bigoted ways to discuss the issue of Israel without resorting to the kind of crude ethnic who-is-a-Jew stereotyping you do here.
And you co-opt Madison in the way bigots always do – to say nasty things about a group you dislike. You would NEVER allow it to pass if I justified broadsides about Muslims citing Madison. Why would doing the same to Jews be any more justifiable?
“are they the jewish right, or likudnik Jews? yes. they are.”
Au contraire. Rahm Emanuel is not a “Likudnik Jew” and in discussion like those here, no time in taken to actually define the politics and political positions of the target. Dan Shapiro is criticized for being a Jew. Rahm Emanuel is criticized for being a Jew. You look at Jews who contribute to political campaigns and you look at one thing before all others – their religion.
“you valorize criticism of christians because of the history of discrimination.”
You need to read what I wrote. I did NOT valorize criticism of Christians. I said that criticism of the CHRISTIAN RIGHT is acceptable principally because they outwardly define their movement as political and actively seek to legislate their religious beliefs. I also believe that given that, historically, the Christian Right has been a driving force behind societal discrimination in the United States, they are a legitimate object of criticism and concern.
See, this is exactly what I’m talking about Phil. You make a point about the Christian right. I respond. You then accuse me of valorizing criticism of Christians, something completely and totally different, and in fact, something that, once again, I expressly disclaim. You need to be more careful with your language.
“we see a history of hateful discrimination in the Jewish State.”
But you do not see a history of hateful discrimination by Jewish Americans towards others here, and the nature of the comments on this post have asserted that American Jews as a group nefariously use their money to put their co-religionists in office principally for Jewish benefit. And moreover, you see a history of hateful discrimination in many countries. Saudi Arabia has a history of hateful discrimination against women and Jews and lots of other groups. They are an Islamic state. Can I make broadside statement about how Muslims use their money in America to push their community politics without being called racist by people here?
“And the difficulty for me is that when Dershowitz says that it is the sacred mission of American Jews to support that state, and when even Jewish liberals are unable to criticize the state out of some sense of allegiance (relatives of mine, say, or famously per Leon Golub who explained, what is a jewish artist, an artist who can never talk about israel) to the larger community, and when goldstone is excommunicated by some jewish groups because of his criticisms, then Jews like myself feel an urgency in analyzing the commandments inside the jewish community that are barring this discussion.”
Again, Desrhowitz makes a political statement about what Jews should support. You respond by making and allowing others to make ethnic statements about what Jews do with their money that echoes familiar antisemitic tropes. Indeed, people like Antidote say about Jews and money that it has always been thus. There’s a line between political discussion and ethnic bigotry. It is regularly crossed here.
“dont have time now, but you really are shutting down debate.”
How am I shutting down debate? Who is stopping here because of what I say? Why can you not have the debate without the antisemitism Phil? What is wrong with your movement that you cannot separate the politics from the bigotry?
“free speech means free speech. you’re policing it in these moralistic ways aimed at stopping people from imagining different futures based on discussion.”
I’m not shutting down your free speech by criticizing the antisemitism here anymore than anyone is shutting down mine by calling me a racist. This is typical radical left whining, Phil. Shutting down speech means you don’t get to talk. And talk you do, ad infinitum. It is not shutting down free speech for me to criticize what you say, particularly in a place where I represent a minority viewpoint, as I do here.
“Thsi society requires the energies of Jews, let us end that discrimination; and great privilege has resulted, and we are the wealthiest group by religion in the u.s. ”
Who cares, Phil? Many of us are Chassidim who are on welfare. The fact that Jews are successful that not mean we deserve to be the targets of hate speech. Episcopalians are rich too. They give plenty of money to causes. Where’s the criticism of them? How about Catholics? Many of them are doing well. Where’s the criticism of them?
“And all this privilege demands reflection… as it is, you would confine me to the tired themes of my first 45 years, ones i also propagated in a lot of journalism, when i went out to find bad goyim, and frankly i just dont find that so interesting as the fact that israelis kill a 63 year old man in his bed at 3 am in the occupied territories and my entire community except for the incredible JVP organization has nothing to say about it.”
You’re again changing the subject. How does this give you or anyone else to say that Rahm Emanuel is first and foremost a Jew who got his position by relying on some Jewish cabal or point out before all else that Dan Shapiro is a Jew, ignoring his substantive qualifications?
What happens in Israel does not justify your bigotry. Not now, not ever.
the difficulty with this entire discussion is that its fine for you to generalize on the positive side. Zionism was a Jewish invention, widely thought to be the greatest achievement of Jewish life in the 20th c including by liberals like Leonard Fein; and its downslide into Jim Crow is now also a Jewish problem. Rahm Emanuel is Jewish but he also takes his family on vacation in the occupied Golan Heights. There are many Jews who dont share this program, and they generally declare themselves, and it’s a beautiful thing. But Dersh is hardly alone in celebrating support for Israel as a Jewish imperative. This kind of language is everywhere in Jewish organizational life, including reform synagogues with theflag of Israel on the stage. And so much of the money coming from Jews in politics is given with this fervent desire, supporting Israel, that it is often hard to be precise. When Amy Goodman asked, Why the rush to war with Iran– truly a disastrous end for the U.S.– Seymour Hersh said, Jewish money.
Something like Bill Cosby saying to the black community, We’ve got a problem with fatherless households. I’m sure you hectored him too
“Phil, it’s very simple. We don’t judge people based on the color of their skin or their religious grouping. We judge them based on the content of their character. You repeatedly fail to do this when it comes to the Jews you criticize, and you have created a community here of people who do the same. This does not help your cause.”
So then why do you care?? What I mean by this is this: if this principle — of judging people by who they are as individuals and not based on what “group” they belong to — is so damned important to you, then how in the hell do you justify your support for Israel, a country that does exactly the opposite??
funny you should raise the issue of the Christian right.
Just watched Chris Hedges on a panel with ?? Karabell & Reza Aslan. Aslan was disappointing — shallow, wimpy in the power of his intellectual analysis. Hedges was of Jeremiad proportions, so maybe Aslan just paled by comparison.
Even tho Hedges saw with his own eyes Israeli soldiers “lure children like mice to a trap, then shoot and kill them for sport,” I have never heard Hedges say condemnatory things about Israel. But he is fiercely critical of the Christian right & Christian zionists. Perhaps because he is so committed to Christianity from his childhood (son of a Presbyterian minister) and education (years in divinity school, qualified for ordination but not ordained). When you are so immersed, and imbue with such value, something like Christian legacy, moral teaching, etc., it hurts like hell to see it debased. It must be like the pain that Mooser feels at the pall that zionism casts over Judaism.
“the difficulty with this entire discussion is that its fine for you to generalize on the positive side.”
The difference is that I base what I say on history, and you base what you say on what religion people are. What I say (ex. Jews emphasize education) is amply supported sociologically and academically. What you say (Jews use nefarious Jewish money networks to run our political life) is not.
“Zionism was a Jewish invention, widely thought to be the greatest achievement of Jewish life in the 20th c including by liberals like Leonard Fein; and its downslide into Jim Crow is now also a Jewish problem. ”
And criticizing Zionism is fine. Zionism is a political ideology. But that’s not what’s going on here.
“Rahm Emanuel is Jewish but he also takes his family on vacation in the occupied Golan Heights.”
Many people who go to Israel visit the Golan Heights. But the question is what does this have to do with Rahm becoming mayor of Chicago?
“But Dersh is hardly alone in celebrating support for Israel as a Jewish imperative. This kind of language is everywhere in Jewish organizational life, including reform synagogues with theflag of Israel on the stage.”
Perfectly OK to criticize putting the flag of Israel in the synagogue. But do you criticize Greek-Americans who display the flag of Greece? Or, for that matter, Arab-Americans who hold marches carrying the flag of Palestine?
“And so much of the money coming from Jews in politics is given with this fervent desire, supporting Israel, that it is often hard to be precise. ”
I don’t get the sense that anyone here is trying very hard, and I think you’re overstating the money case.
“When Amy Goodman asked, Why the rush to war with Iran– truly a disastrous end for the U.S.– Seymour Hersh said, Jewish money.”
And I find that ridiculous, since lots of countries in the world are worried about Iran, and many of them have few Jews.
“Something like Bill Cosby saying to the black community, We’ve got a problem with fatherless households. I’m sure you hectored him too”
See, you keep making these inappropriate comparisons. Actually, I think Cosby went too far in certain ways and was high-handed. But since you bring it up, look at the stark difference between you and him. Why did Black people listen to Bill Cosby? Why did they turn out to his talks? Because no one questions Bill Cosby’s commitment to the Black community. Bill Cosby has always fully identified with the Black community. He’s contributed mightily to Black causes. He’s supported African-American politicians. He’s been a visible leader in the Black community for many years. No one would ever accuse Bill Cosby of trying to be white, a charge regularly hurled at conservative Black leaders like Ward Connerly or John McWhorter who are embraced by mostly white male commentators on Fox News as tokens to criticize policies much of the Black community supports, like affirmative action.
You’ve never identified as part of the Jewish community. You’ve always been an outsider. Like most people in your movement, you’re completely assimilated. You’re proud of that, proud of being intermarried. Indeed, you valorize people like Israel Shahak who made it his mission in life to write polemical books about how bad religious Judaism is and was. Many people in your movement make no secret of their belief that Jews should dispense with their faith and assimilate like you did. And you want to be our Bill Cosby and come now and tell us what to do.
You just don’t have the credibility, my man.
if phil had no credibility you wouldn’t be here. and who are you claiming to represent the jewish community and saying phil was never as part of it? phil definitely identifies with part of the jewish community, you just don’t like that part so you don’t recognize it.
you’re engaging in anti semitism and you don’t even kmow it. you’re being a bully.
Many people who go to Israel visit the Golan Heights. But the question is what does this have to do with Rahm becoming mayor of Chicago?
because people running for public office should not be empowering illegally occupied territory against international law.
you just don’t recognize israel crimes and therefor it doesn’t count to you.
if you care to be in denial about the influence of money on our political system fine. you can bellyache all you want that your version of reality is based on history, but that you do not recognize isn’t.
so what? you’re like a little jealous man sniping on phil’s trousers. it’s silly. we’re all becoming impervious to your personal antisemitism focused on your obsession with phil. you fly your tribal anti semitism flag proudly for all to see.
you think silencing dissent will wipe it out of history. it won’t.
Dont try and pretend your on the high ground Hophmi. We’ve heard you cry on this site many a time. Now to dissect anyone’s statements point by point is your specialty, it’s just what he writes seems to resonate more than what you write.
Credibility is relative, my man. (btw: come up with some better phrases, my man! We shouldn’t have to suffer from the lack of street ‘jive’ of a BK homeboy. But you know, ‘whatever’ floats your boat, dude’.) :D
Annie, the I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I approach is not going to work.
I am not holding myself out as a Jewish leader.
“if you care to be in denial about the influence of money on our political system fine.”
I do not deny the influence of money in politics. I deny that there is anything particularly Jewish about it and assert to claim as such is bigoted.
“because people running for public office should not be empowering illegally occupied territory against international law.”
Lots of politicians who run and get elected support things that are illegal under laws national and international.
“so what? you’re like a little jealous man sniping on phil’s trousers.”
LOL. I’m not jealous of Phil. I’m critical of Phil. There’s a difference.
“we’re all becoming impervious to your personal antisemitism focused on your obsession with phil. you fly your tribal anti semitism flag proudly for all to see.”
Again, the I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I approach is not going to work.
“you think silencing dissent will wipe it out of history. it won’t.”
I’m not silencing dissent, Annie. I have a right to express my opinion.
hophmi, you claim to be credentialed in fighting antisemitism. I’ll admit I have seen antisemitism on this site but the vast majority of it is spouted off by European Supremacist Zionists such as yourself who would recoil at the notion they were actually Semitic. I have Arab grandparents and the last time I checked that made me a Semite. So I’m going to ask you again so you can’t pretend like you didn’t see it:
Do you have a drop of Semitic blood in your body?
Annie, the I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I approach is not going to work.
copy/paste works just fine hophmi. i never asked you to define me.
I am not holding myself out as a Jewish leader.
and i never called you a leader or implied you were one. diversion noted. i said you tried to represent (speak for) the jewish community. as if phil’s friend who are jewish do not count. as if the jewish community was solely for zionists.
I deny that there is anything particularly Jewish about it and assert to claim as such is bigoted.
when money is directed at politicians or organizations to support a foreign state named israel and withheld when that support is not forthcoming it is most definitely for a jewish cause and money has power. the forward:
from lucas’s press release (on the front page here) “”I’m preparing to organize a boycott that would certainly involve some of the Center’s most generous donors,” said Lucas.
you can bellyache all you want there’s no truth to the idea of ‘anything particularly Jewish about it ‘ and you can try to intimidate me by calling me a bigot and tell phil there is no ‘history’. but i can give example after example.
I’m not silencing dissent, Annie. I have a right to express my opinion.
you’re a bully and i’m not a bigot. i can give you more examples if you want. but engaging in blatant anti semitism (‘you’re not part of the jewish community’) iow, you’re not really a jew. that in essence is what you are saying. you are not owning phil’s ideas therefore you reject that those ideas are jewish ideas. that is essential what you are saying. so no, you are not just giving your opinion you are negating phil’s by way of stripping him of his jewish identity. that is how it sounds to me. ‘you’re ethnicity doesn’t say that’.
Lots of politicians who run and get elected support things that are illegal under laws national and international.
and they get criticized for it too! or is that bigoted also? how about you make an example of a politician supporting policies against international law (like torture) divorced from israel, where no one complains. or where that complaint is met w/’bigot’.
or is it just rahn who gets a pass from you?
LOL. I’m not jealous of Phil. I’m critical of Phil. There’s a difference.
try focusing on his ideas and not his ethnicity. it may be more convincing. you act obsessed. stay out of his jewishness if you can’t respect it. argue his ideas on their own merit.
” Indeed, people like Antidote say about Jews and money that it has always been thus.”
Why do you have this mental block, hophmi? If Abe Foxman writes a book about “Jews and Money”, discussing the same prominent old trope, do you call him an anti-semite? I haven’t read his book, but there are several recent publications on the same topic. You do want to shut down debate, no question about it.
And I agree with Phil’s point that it’s ok for you to agree ‘on the positive side’. Stereotypes such as “Jews are good with money’ are fine as long as they work out in favor of Jews (“Let’s hire the Jew. Jews are good with money”), but if professional and financial success makes Jews unpopular and incites envy (as is the case with any successful and rich people) you get all upset about it and scream anti-semitism. Makes no sense at all.
How about “there’s a lot of Noble prize winners who are Jewish?”
Two can play “Jewish geography” as well as one. If reality calls for
counting heads beautiful, doesn’t it also call for counting heads loaded with warts? If beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, so is ugliness. Mama’s precious children may also be the town bullies. Even if Mama controls the local newspapers, police, and town historian, eventually the truth will out, spread, and be acted on if the bullies don’t stop. In this sense world history reflects this never-ending cycle.
You’re saying that the appointment of an ambassador to Israel just happens to be a Jew?
“and you know, did well wherever they were and earned these appointment.”
As Jews always do!
Saban wanted the dude in so he got it. Simple as that.
How about the identity of so many star neocons? They just happen to be too. Why are there so many Mel Gibson types in Hollywood? I guess it just happens to be…
They missed one of the most inculpating of Rumsfeld’s remarks. I can’t find it right now, but it’s to the effect that they settled on the WMD excuse because it was the one “easiest to sell to the public” or words to that effect.
He said this. He admitted it wasn’t the real reason, but it was the most plausible lie.
i believe that was wolfowitz in vanity fair?
Might have been. One of the inner neocons. None of whom are in the dock at the Hague for waging aggressive war.
Look, just brace yourselves. Given the level of political discourse in the US, I can garauntee that the process of extricating ourselves from Israel’s grip will be replete with “anti-Semetism”. If you want proof, just look at the level on which problems and conflicts with Muslims and “Arabs” are discussed and dealt with, or even the discourse on domestic civil rights at this time.
For two reasons, first, the media need to sensationalise and polarise, and second, the Zionist need to scare American Jews into compliance.
It’s gonna be ugly.
I never could spell “guarantee”
i dont know why you even try
they weeded me out with eleemosynary
yeah, Tony Ulasewicz got weeded out with eleemosynary too.
>> I never could spell “guarantee”
That’s okay – despite being Canadian, I was never able to say “about” and make it sound like “a-boot”. I must be, like, doing it wrong, eh? :-)
I was never able to say “about” and make it sound like “a-boot”. I must be, like, doing it wrong, eh? :-)
I was pretty worried for you for a moment, but your ability to put “eh?” at the end of your sentence proves that you are not beyond redemption. ;-)
Is that why you left the tribe, moosee?
Who says he’s left? I view it more that Mooser has perspective. The same way I do. I still consider myself white, German-Polish and Catholic (the latter in spite of the fact that I don’t really practice or participate in the church and it’s more an acknowledgement of the culture in which I was raised). I haven’t left my “tribe.” There’s no reason to, necessarily (although Zionists are actively trying to purge non-Zionist Jews, I think).
You’re right chaos, I shoulda said “left the zionist wannabe tribe”.
Heck, I have a faint memory of one of his posts from a couple of years ago where he was with megafone celebrating his early (teenage?) escape from the ziocain drip and chlorophyll.
It was the song and wild dance of a liberated man indeed – that post was.
“you believe that African Americans lack some quality that your people have…”
Yeah, and they stole “the Blues” from the Jews! Of course, it used to be called “the Kvetch”.
Don’t lose sight of my point (since I so rarely have one)! The “debate” or “discourse” about (if it is even possible) at least disentangling the US from Israel will be conducted (maybe not here, of course) on the same level as the rest of our political discourse, and it will be very ugly!!! Don’t let it dishearten you!
And as far as I can see from the Zio-trolls here, they have a vested interest in making it as bad as possible. And the media too.
And oddly enough (and I have found this too be true my entire gefilte-fish-out-of-water life) the very unfamiliarity of most American with anti-Semitic tropes will make it even easier for them to pick them up!
It’ll be nasty.
You’re right, Mooser. I have to confess that I prefer not to think about that. It’s hard to feel sorry for the eventual future when the fires that Israel Lobby inquisitors set will eventually ignite their own dusty robes, and it’s not fun to think about how much that will tear American civil society apart. But I do feel sorry, in advance, for what this will do to innocent Jews who have either been uninvolved, or actively fighting it.
“Who says he’s left?”
I am very much a Jew, will always be a Jew, just can’t leave it.
Like the fellow who famously complained about not getting enough of that funky stuff, “I’ve tried!, I’ve tried!”, and I always end up my old Jewish self. Look, I’m not the only one: Look at Sammy Davis! He tried, too, but he ended up going back to his Jewish roots. Every “Davis” I ever knew was Jewish, I don’t know who he thought he was kidding. But I’m getting tangentine (have a slice) here.
Still a Jew, and in fact, I have (more often than not) heard people describe me as “a typical Jew”. And when you are talking about people who have never met a Jew before, that’s high praise, indeed!
“of a liberated man…”
Well, sorry, but no. I’m pretty much still in the closet, a latent heterosexual.
Oh wait a minute, I spoke without thinking. It would be much more accurate to say that I cannot stop (not that I have any desire to) thinking of myself as a Jew. Okay, if you want to get technical about it, I have not checked with Hophmi, “eee”, Yonira or Witty to see what my actual status is, Jewish-wise.
I think they’d classify you as ‘Self Hating’ – or just plain ‘Traitor’
Just substitute, “German-Irish” for me, and I totally agree with you Chaos. Mooser’s as Jewish as one can get–he’s a prize. I’d vote for him for US President or Israeli honcho. Why? Because he constantly exhibits the most piercing objectivity and sense of fairness. He’s a stand-up comedian who really has no taboos. I’d vote for George Carlin too, if he still lived. We are ruled by those who have a very narrow sense of irony. The best one can say about them is that they are naive and ignorant. The truth is that they are all punch-pullers; they throw the fight everytime.
“It’s gonna be ugly.”
It doesn’t have to be, and I do hope it won’t be. And btw, that’s what Ernst Zundel says. I watched this interview of Zundel and an Israeli journalist. Obviously, there’s a problem with the level of discourse re Holocaust deniers. I wouldn’t have touched Zundel with a ten foot pole before I saw this. But now I realize, without being convinced about his take on casualties and gas chambers in any way, that there has been a tremendous amount of disinformation and defamation. And the question is: why? and to what end are people like Zundel persecuted and imprisoned as a ‘security risk’?
Watch and read this:
link to dailymotion.com
link to foreignpolicyjournal.com
I guess, Mooser, you are saying that the cartoon of Arabs drawn by the PTB today can be reissued with different top coverings tomorrow?
>> As Jews always do!
Makes sense: Jews are a superior race…errr, nation…I mean, “collective”. Or was it religion? (Chosen) People? It’s hard to keep track.
“Jews are a superior race…”
Yes, I was told continuously while growing up (by my father) that Jews have more natural rhythm and musical ability, more “soul” if you will, than anybody else! He was constantly pointing out to me the many Jews in the popular music and Jazz fields, and charging me to emulate them. For him, there was no choice between Ben Gurion and Benny Goodman.
just bow when in the presence of one, keep your lips sealed, and you needn’t worry about it.
see if almost anyone else here said that it’d be funny because no one else would really be serious when they say something like that, but we all already know that that is something you most likely truly believe
I am really afraid one day, there will be a civil war in Israel and Jews will start killing each other in large numbers. Then everyone will say, “See, we knew all the time that Israel was a bankrupt culture that would destroy itself”.
i dont want this to happen any more than civil war in libya. that is why we are urging people to climb down off the ladder now, long before they give demogogic rants on television
rachelgolem, I think when it’s all said and done (although this in no way ameliorates or excuses the crimes against the Palestinians) that the story of Zionism will be very much a story of Jews committing crimes against or taking advantage of the unfortunate circumstances of other Jews. Or taking advantage of their good intentions, religiousity or cultural isolation. Again, looking to the history of other colonial projects will be very instructive.
the story of Zionism will be very much a story of Jews committing crimes against or taking advantage of the unfortunate circumstances of other Jews.
Agreed, and I further think that’s why they put the clamp on discussing the Holocaust with any degree of granularity in Europe. With the force of law. My brother’s wife’s family (Jewish) have horrific stories to tell about what happened to them at the hands of Zionists in Europe during WWII.
“long before they give demogogic rants on television”
OT, but I’ve always thought that was one of the great privileges of being a dictator, along with the fancy uniforms, the bodyguard made up of strapping young lasses, the Swiss bank accounts, the gorgeous palaces, the Tonton Macoute dark glasses, the bodyguard made up of healthy young women, the grovelling obsequity of your underlings, the huge bulletproof car, the teenage girl bodyguards who will accommodate your every whim, the cheering crowds, the military march past as you stand on your podium surrounded by the young women of your bodyguard…
Any vacancies I could apply for?
“I am really afraid one day, there will be a civil war in Israel and Jews will start killing each other in large numbers.”
Rachelgolem, how else we will eliminate the traitors to Judaism? Do you have a better idea for those who betray the Jewish State? You would tolerate those who would desecrate and destroy (both!) our religious and cultural traditions and laws? What are you going to say next, that those who have a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother are still real Jews?
Rachel, the real Jews must take a stand, and eliminate those who would destroy our Jewish State, even if they are our neighbors, or in our own family!
Look at what you are saying, Rachel! First, we start to tolerate the Reform, the shrimp-eaters, the intermarriers. Then before you know it, our girls, good Jewish girls like you are marrying Gentiles, or even (may G-d forgive me for the utterance) Arabs!
You don’t think it’s better to purify ourselves, get the waste, the wanna-bes and pretenders out before they dilute our pure Jewish blood and desecrate our Jewish State?
Besides, be pratical, Rachel; there’s about twenty million of us Jews. We can’t all fit in Israel, especially if the Palestinians steal any land from us.
Do you want Israel to be populated by a race of weak, half-Jewish cretins, liberals, socialists? No, never! So the only chance is to purify our race, and eliminate the internal danger to our Jewish State!
I know that when the time comes, you will be on the right side, Rachel!
The rain will come in its time.
The problem with people like Mathews is that they accept they idea that possession of certain weapons can justify going to war. What war that you ever read about in history was justified on the basis that some other country had ‘weapons?’. Even if your adversary had a superior arsenal, it alone can not justify aggression. When you consider the overwhelming superiority of the US arsenal, the whole case for war in iraq is even more ridiculous. The fact people supported the war on the basis of possession of weapons is depressing. The neocons were able to tap into the arrogant assumption in western the society that the US and its allies have the right to sit in judgement of whether or not another country should or shouldn’t be allowed to have weapons.
As for ‘curveball’, Presidents and their advisors are always going to be thrown a lot of ‘curveballs.’ There are always going to be an array of spies out there with all kinds of conflicting information, always enemies or friends of a given regime who will lie or exagerrate to support their agenda. If a President decides to go to war, he or she will always be able to cherry pick whatever information justifies the decision for war. That has always been the case, but with the explosion in information technology it has become a lot easier.
Excellent point and so true.
Absolutely!
One of the great stains on British history is the bombardment of Copenhagen in 1807 – this was to stop certain weapons, ie some modern ships, falling into French hands and being used to block our ‘vital’ link to Russia. And of course we bombarded Oran in 1940 to keep the same sort of weapons from falling into German hands.
The weapons in these cases did actually exist, though, and war was already raging or threatening to break out all over the world.
In 1807 Lord Erskine remarked that if God had not yet invented hell He would need to do so now in order to burn the British government for their ‘damnable measure’.
In fact, it’s the contrary. If your adversary had a superior arsenal, you wouldn’t dare, which is why the US hasn’t laid a finger on North Korea.
might not be the arsenal, Shingo. might be something to do with North Korea’s neighbors.
No, fuster, contries with nukes don;t get invaded.
Shingo, I hope that you’re correct.
Fuster, Israel has never claimed it has nukes, so what’s the basis of your hope?
Sorry for writing so many posts. My furore scribendimust be acting up again.
Amo tuus cacoethes scribendi
Try a cool wet paper towel down there, Mooser.
“The elephant in the room”.
OIL.
If OIL was ever important when it comes to US policy and Israel, Truman would not have ignored the entire state department. Big Oil has no influence in this particular matter.
Exactly, O. I. L. as in
Oil
Israel and
Logistics (military bases).
One has to laugh and Matthews. Does any one buy the BS that he was skeptical of the war? I remember him fawning over how good Bush looked when he landed on the carrier in the Mission accomplished moment.
What amazes me as he reads from the 2002 NIE how the similarities with Iran NIE completely allude him.
Kaplan also repeats a common lie, that Saddam had built nukes before. In fact, Saddam never make a single nuke.
Phil goes a little overboard here.
When George Bush junior was running for president he believed in two things, one a vague overriding belief and the second a very specific belief: the vague belief was in God, this included George junior’s destiny to become president, but to put the phrase lightly- God had turned him around from a foolish man to a man of destiny. The specific belief was in lowering taxes.
On the way to the presidency George junior chose Dick Cheney to be his “strategic thinker” and vice president. This is the key moment. At this time George junior is not thinking about one term or two terms, he is thinking about winning the white house, something that he only accomplished with five justices from the Supreme Court, so he had other obstacles to overcome and was not yet worrying about a second term.
When did Dick Cheney become a Next Century Plan man? I don’t know. Why did he become a PNAC man? I don’t know. Did George junior’s choice of Cheney hinge on this PNAC connection or line of thought? I don’t think so- George was unready for the presidency so he took an adult along and that adult was Dick Cheney. Putting Dick Cheney in the vice president’s chair and then 9/11 happens and adding two and two to make four is no easier than to predict a war against Iraq. The sales job done by the lobby and the fear/hatred/macho factor of the media and the lies told by the administration are all predictable necessities based upon the two things occurring at once: Dick Cheney in the vice president’s chair and 9/11.
WJ, i think you have the story of dick and gwb in reverse. cheney was the man but he had no charisma. george was hand picked for the job by cheney and others (it’s been written about, they sat him down and anointed him). legend has it cheney was ‘tapped’ to find george a vp and then chose himself but i think all along it was cheney in the drivers seat, george played the front man.
Obama was picked by Penny Pritzker et al.
I encourage folks to contact Chris Matthews directly he is sincerely interested in what the peasants think. Far more than I believe Rachel Maddow or Olbermann are. Pressure him to start reporting about the I/P issue. I think Matthews, Dylan Ratigan and Cenk Uygar are our best bets on MSNBC. Rachel Maddow persistently pledges allegiance to the I lobby by repeating unsubstantiated claims about Iran
From my vantage and I watched Chris Matthews almost every evening before the invasion for a solid year I think he is spinning how much he stood against the invasion. He did challenge David “axis of evil” Frum , Bill Kristol and a few others but he did not go nearly far enough. He did not even go close to providing us with accurate or diverse opinions about the WMD intelligence. He did not have former weapons inspector Scott Ritter on his program before the invasion. Ritter had been in Iraq for a great deal of time during the 90′s. He did not have IAEA El Baradei on who came out in early Feb of 2003 and said the Niger Documents were forgeries. He did not have former CIA analysts Ray McGovern, Bill and Kathleen Christison and many others who were questioning the validity of the pre war intelligence.
While he went further than the other MSM “groupthink” talking heads who did not try to inform the American public with accurate well scrutinized information…he did not go far enough.
Now that Donald Rumsfeld is out filling our air waves and insulting us with more spin, more lies about the Iraq invasion. We are hearing a few talking heads like Andrea Mitchell stepping out of line after the disaster during her interview with Rumsfeld but still they are tip toeing which Jon Stewart did last night with Rumsfeld. At least Stewart mentioned the Office of Special Plans which many of us were reading about in the Guardian, the Independent and the Nation before the invasion. But why has it taken so long for these talking heads to be aware or mention the “stovepiping” of intelligence.
Why is that Andrea Mitchell, Jon Stewart, Chris Matthews are not mentioning that not one person has not been held accountable for the Niger Documents?
I have a great idea.
Why don’t you all give up your jobs and all your relationships and devote your lives to writing long boring articles about the difference between the “GOOD JEWS and the BAD JEWS”?
Oh my, I am too late. You have all already done that!!!!!